THREE

'Well, Dad, how do I look?'

Terry turned around to face his daughter and sighed inwardly. For the first time in his life, he saw his daughter as a young woman, instead of a child. She looked absolutely stunning, but instead of being pleased Terry felt a wave of dread wash over him as he realised his little baby, who he thought would look like a little girl for ever, had shot up a few inches overnight, sprouted breasts and had turned into a right little cracker.

If Terry could have had his way, he'd have kept her in bunches and ankle socks until she was at least twenty-one. He knew deep down that he had to let Billie grow up, but the thing that worried him was the thought of grown men lusting after her. She looked so much older than her tender fifteen years, and he'd personally mutilate anyone over the age of twenty-one who even dared to look at her in a sexual way.

Swallowing his thoughts, he smiled at her. 'You look lovely, Bill, really lovely.'

Billie walked up to him and gave him a big hug. She knew her dad hated her growing up and had been expecting him to throw a fit over the adult-looking outfit she was wearing. A fitted dress, high-heeled shoes, lipstick and mascara would normally send her dad into a frenzy. Thankfully, today he seemed quite calm.

'Right, I'm ready, do I look all right?' Michelle sauntered into the room in a black trouser suit, matched with leopard skin bag, shoes and hat.

'You look really nice, Mum, doesn't she, Dad?'

Terry glanced at his daughter and admired the fact that she was such a good liar. Looking his wife up and down, he chose to be polite. 'You look nice, Chelle.'

In fact, in all honesty, he'd seen her look a damn sight worse. Due to her weight gain, Chelle normally looked like a bundle of shit tied up ugly. This outfit, which had set him back three hundred quid from a boutique in Loughton, kind of flattered her.

Terry smiled at his wife and daughter. 'Ready to make tracks then?'

'Yep,' they both replied in unison.

Angie Smith became Mrs Bones at two o'clock that afternoon at Langtons Register Office in Hornchurch. The evening reception was being held in a function room in Upminster and another hundred guests were expected to join in the celebrations. Albie Bones was Benny's younger brother. Angie would be wife number four.

Terry stood at the bar with Davey Mullins, chatting to a couple of blokes who owned a car site in Brentwood. Auctions were the topic of conversation and Terry was bored shitless by the two Larry Largenuts he and Dave were lumbered with. Excusing themselves, Terry and Dave headed to the toilets. Avoiding the bar like the plague on the way back, they decided to join the girls.

'All right, ladies? Enjoying yourselves are you?'

Before anyone had a chance to acknowledge them, Chelle piped up. 'You all know my husband, don't you, girls? The one and only Charlie Bigbananas. Two hours I've been sitting here and he's only just bothered to come and talk to me and see if I'm all right.'

Terry gave his wife a pitying look. 'Don't start, Chelle, not tonight. I'm tired, Billie's here and I'm really not in the mood for your fucking antics. Your eyes are rolling, how much you had to drink?'

'I've only had a few. Keeping tabs on me are you?' Chelle replied cockily. Michelle rarely gave it the big-'un indoors. She was far too scared that Terry would walk out the door and not come back. Things changed, though, as soon as she met up with her gym pals. As soon as Chelle was in their company, her personality changed completely. She liked to give it the big-'un, make out she wore the trousers and ruled the roost. Instead of looking cool, she made herself look incredibly stupid. A complete prat in fact.

Terry sat quietly, sipping his JD and Coke, surveying the situation. The karaoke had now started and Benny had been the first one to get up singing with his rendition of 'Mack the Knife'. Terry smiled to himself whilst weighing up the women around him.

Lisa was a typical Dave-type of bird. Blonde, young, tarty, she was as common and as thick as two short planks. He'd only just moved his last bird out a few weeks before he'd met Lisa, then within a month he'd moved her in. Davey Boy was one of these blokes who hated living on his own and Terry had lost count of the amount of birds he'd had living with him over the years. The one thing they all had in common was that they were all in their twenties, brainless and dressed like whores. Terry glanced around at the rest of the table.

Hazel Short, Terry had quite a lot of time for. He'd known her old man Stan quite well and knew that Hazel had been the brains behind Stan's bollocks. She was well clued up, was Hazel, and definitely no man's fool. Stan had been dead for years now and Hazel's fortune just went on growing and growing.

Suzie Robinson, Terry wasn't quite so sure about. She came across as pleasant enough but he'd always hated her current old man Richie, so he had his reservations about her.

Julie Beale frightened Terry more than any woman he'd ever met in his lifetime. He'd always imagined that she'd been born a boy, had her bollocks chopped off, took hormone tablets, grown tits and overnight had renamed herself Julie. He knew that for years she'd plied her trade at the local wash-and-wank shop, and he couldn't believe that any man could be that desperate to want to fuck someone that looked like Giant Haystacks with tits.

'Right, can I have Michelle and the gang up on stage please.'

'Come on, girls, that's us,' Chelle said excitedly, galloping towards the karaoke.

'You all right, Dad?' Billie noticed her father sitting alone at the table and decided to join him. She had been standing with a couple of girls and a crowd of lads near the stage, but as soon as she'd seen her mother and her friends leap up there, she'd decided to make a quick exit. Scott, whom she'd been talking to, was a nice lad and she didn't want to have to explain that the fat drunken woman on stage was her mother.

'I'm all right, Bill. You having a good time, girl? Who are them lads you were standing with?'

'I know one of them from school, Dad, but the one with the short blond hair that I've been chatting to is Scott. He's a really nice boy. He's seventeen and has a really good job up town. He's asked me to go to the pictures next week, do you mind if I go, Dad?'

'I want to have a look at him first, Princess. Bring him over, so I can vet him and if I like the look of him, you can go. Deal?'

'Yes, deal. I know you'll like him, Dad, he's really nice.'

After absolutely murdering Diana Ross's 'Baby Love', Chelle and her pals went on to crucify 'Young Hearts Run Free', followed by 'Leader of the Pack'. Karaoke Kevin, who was a student by day and did his night-time job to pay for his education, had now had a gutful of the four women standing on the stage who refused to leave.

'Now come on, girls, you must get off the stage. Other people are waiting to have a turn.'

'Shut up, you mug, and give us the mike back,' Kevin heard one of the girls say. He really didn't need this shit. All of the lads he roomed with from uni had jobs working in Tesco or Sainsbury's to earn a bit of pocket money. Kevin decided there and then that he was selling the karaoke equipment his parents had bought for him and would join his friends on the checkouts as quickly as possible.

Chelle stood on the stage, glaring at Kevin. 'Look, I promise,' she slurred. 'Let me sing one more and that's it.'

Kevin didn't really have any choice in the matter. 'OK, just one more song.'

Michelle looked at her friends. 'Now sod off, girls, and let me sing this one on my own. I want to dedicate it to my wonderful fucking husband.'

Hazel, Suzie and Julie could feel trouble brewing and left the stage without argument. None of them wanted to get on the wrong side of Terry.

'Right, ladies and gentlemen,' Kevin announced, 'I have a lady here who wants to dedicate a song to her husband.'

Michelle stood at the front of the stage with the mike in her hand. She was drunk now, really drunk, and was swaying from side to side. She didn't care, she felt really important, the hall was silent and she had everybody's attention. 'This song is going out especially for my other half. Everyone knows who he is, 'cause he is the ultimate Charlie Bigbananas.'

At this point the hall was so quiet, you could have heard a pin drop. 'Well, I want all you people to know, he thinks I'm stupid and I'm anything but. I know he's having an affair and all I can say is lucky her, whoever she is. Tel, this song's for you, babe.' Chelle then proceeded to sing Chas and Dave's 'Ain't No Pleasing You'.

Terry and Billie sat at the table feeling absolutely mortified.

'Dad, I'm so embarrassed, what are we gonna do? What will Scott and my friends think of me?'

Terry looked at his daughter's flushed cheeks and could have cried for her. 'Don't worry, Bill, it's your mother that's showed herself up, not you. Your friends won't think any less of you, darling, and I'll tell you what me and you will do. The day you turn sixteen, we're leaving your mother for good. We'll get a nice place of our own, just the two of us.'

'Really? Oh, Dad, I'd love that. Do you really mean it?'

'I'm not joking, Princess. I'm deadly serious. Between me and you, it's something I've had planned for ages. I've never said anything to you before, the time just wasn't right.'

'Oh Dad, I can't wait. It'll be great me and you sharing a house together.' Billie forgot about her embarrassment briefly. She couldn't think of anything better than getting away from her mother. Over the years, Billie had tried so hard to build a relationship with her, she really had, but all her efforts had amounted to nothing. Her mother had no time for her and that was that. Billie had just had to learn to live with it.

'Oh darling, I'm a-a leaving, that's what I'm gonna do-oo-oo-oo.'

Kevin snatched the mike back quickly. 'A round of applause for Michelle, everybody.' Nobody clapped. Trotting down the stairs that adjoined the stage, Michelle promptly stacked it and fell flat on her face.

'Dad, quick, do something, she's fell over.' Billie could feel her little heart beating nineteen to the dozen. In fact she wished the ground would just open up and swallow her.

'Move out the way,' Terry snarled, as he barged his way across the dance floor and into the crowd that surrounded his wife. Michelle was lying on the floor, like a rhino. The crotch of her trousers had split as she fell, and because she rarely wore knickers, her Jack and Danny was hanging out for all to see. Davey Boy and Terry each took one arm and dragged her towards a table near the door.

'Are you OK, son?' Benny Bones asked Terry sympathetically.

'What do you think?' Terry replied, shooting him a look.

'I'm not drunk you know,' Chelle slurred. 'It's these new shoes. I slipped.'

Propping her on the nearest chair, Terry fished around in her handbag for his car keys. Ordering Dave to stand guard over her, he gestured for Billie to follow him outside.

'I'm never going out with her again, Dad,' Billie said, sobbing.

Terry looked at his daughter and felt so sorry for her. She was a wonderful kid and really didn't deserve to have that thing as a mother. Still, it was his fault really. He'd married the fucking monster and provided her with his sperm in the first place.

'Did you really mean it, Dad, when you said that we could move away soon?'

Terry unlocked the Range Rover, sat Billie in the front seat and clicked her seat belt shut. Smiling, he spoke clearly. 'Listen, Bill, you're not a kid any more and I've had this planned a while. I know I can trust you and there's some other stuff I need to tell you as well. Some of it you might not like. Let's just concentrate on getting your mother home tonight and then tomorrow I'll take you out for lunch. We'll go somewhere quiet and I promise I'll tell you everything.'

'OK, Dad, but you must tell me the truth. I'm not a child any more.'

'You'll get the truth, Princess, I swear.'

Terry had never felt more humiliated in his whole life as when he and Dave carried Chelle out from the reception. He was used to her getting pissed and stacking it. That was her usual party piece, but to get up on the stage and make a show of him over the mike. She'd gone too far this time and he would make sure that she damn well paid for it.

To behave like that in front of Billie was unforgivable. Michelle's days were well and truly numbered.

Nobody made Terry Keane look a cunt and got away with it. Nobody!